Sleep As An Droid For Android

Waking up to a blaring alarm is just torture. Most of the times I’m groggy until coffee hits or angry because my lovely dream was interrupted. Sleep as an Droid is different, it wakes you up nicely.

What is it?

Sleep as an Droid, $1.02, Android It’s a smarter, more considerate alarm clock. It’s smarter because the app can track your sleep cycle and patterns: when you’re in light sleep, when you’re in deep sleep and so on. It’s more considerate because the idea is to wake you up gently, with a soft ascending alarm, when you’re in a period of “light sleep”. That way you’re happier and have more energy to start the day.

Who’s it good for?

People who are groggy, grumpy or just can’t get up in the morning. People who love the snooze button. Even people who just like seeing stats about themselves.

Why’s it better than alternatives?

Alarm clocks could give two quips about how you feel when you wake up. You set a time, they blare. That’s it. Sleep as an Droid does so much more. Not only is it nice to see your sleep habits plotted on a graph, it’s actually really useful! The app learns about your sleep needs and will begin to discover your “ideal sleep range”, it even notifies you the night before when it’s the perfect time to sleep (according to that range). The more you use it, the more it’ll know.

Most importantly, it’s also a helluva lot easier to wake up during “light sleep” than deep REM sleep. So you can spend more time awake doing things instead of being half-asleep. Everyone is healthy and happy!

How could it be even better?

It’d be nice to comment on the night’s rest a little later in the day and not always immediately right after (I’m always too groggy). Also, it’d be super cool if the app knew when you were checking your phone in the middle of the night and not really moving around that much. Oh! More awesome alarm tones too.

It uses the accelerometers in the phone to monitor how much the mattress moves. The phone obviously has to be resting on the mattress, and it loses some accuracy if you are sharing a bed... I found Sleep Cycle on the iPhone to do a pretty good job tho - I'll be getting this one too.